Best Swiss documentary movies

More Than Honey (2012)

With dazzling nature photography, Academy Award®–nominated director Markus Imhoof (The Boat Is Full) takes a global examination of endangered honeybees — spanning California, Switzerland, China and Australia — more ambitious than any previous work on the topic.

Westerly Wind (2018)

A short film attributed to Jean-Luc Godard concerning the ZAD surrounding the proposed Aéroport du Grand Ouest, decrying our capitalist society.

L'harmonie (2013)

A small town nestling in the middle of a snowy expanse. In a crowded hall, some musicians are warming up. Cacophony. The conductor calls for silence. On a river bank at dawn, an old man is fishing alone, alert. Nearby, a band of Indians are marching to music for the carnival. A young hunter stalks her prey on the edge of a forest, while in his bedroom, a teenager struggles with his tie to the deafening sound of symphonic heavy metal rock. Between community and moments of solitude, through a series of lively Friday evening rehearsals and the interminable republican ceremonies, L'harmonie takes us to the heart of this colorful community in search of harmony.

Putin's Witnesses (2018)

Russian Federation, December 31, 1999. After President Boris Yeltsin's unexpected resignation, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin becomes acting president of the country. From that day and for a year, Vitaly Mansky's camera documented Putin's rise to power. The story of a privileged witness. The harsh explanation of the reason why politics is the art of possibility of achieving the best with the support of many, but also of giving the worst in return.

Dark Star: H. R. Giger's World (2014)

An account of the life and work of Swiss painter, sculptor, architect and designer H. R. Giger (1940-2014), tormented father of creatures as fearsome as they are fascinating, inhabitants of nightmarish biomechanical worlds.

A Crude Awakening (2006)

Basil Gelpke and Ray McCormack's nonfiction treatise Crude Awakening joins Maxed Out, An Inconvenient Truth, and other recent documentaries devoted to unearthing and exploring forces that are untying the connective threads of contemporary society. The subject at hand is crude oil - specifically, the depletion of petroleum from the Earth, in an era when consumption threatens to exceed supply.

The Way Things Go (1987)

Artists Peter Fischli and David Weiss create the ultimate Rube Goldberg machine. The pair used found objects to construct a complex, interdependent contraption in an empty warehouse. When set in motion, a domino-like chain reaction ripples through the complex of imaginative devices. Fire, water, the laws of gravity, and chemistry determine the life-cycle of the objects. The process reveals a story concerning cause and effect, mechanism and art, and improbability and precision, in an extended science project that will mesmerize the mind.

Korn: Live At Montreux 2004 (2008)

Korn came out of California in the early nineties and went on to become one of the most globally successful metal acts of their generation. They continue to play live to vast crowds and have record sales in the millions. This concert from Montreux in 2004 is their only performance at the festival to date.

My Life as a Film (2016)

When I came of age, my father gave me a film about my life. It infuriated me, because I had attempted to get away from his camera all my childhood. My father, filmmaker Joschy Scheidegger, documented our family obsessively. It was only when he died that I was impelled to take over not only his extensive film archive, but also his camera. «My Life as a Film» is a personal search for the surprising truths hidden behind my father’s pictures. A philosophical family story about filming and the attempt to capture life.

Free to Run (2016)

Free to Run tells the amazing story of the running movement over the past five decades, the struggle for the right to run - especially for women – against conservative Federations, the explosion of grass roots road races and marathons, until the boom of running as a vast business enterprise.

No Asylum: The Untold Chapter of Anne Frank's Story (2015)

Anne Frank’s father, Otto shows his enduring love for his daughter by desperately seeking visas to save their family from the Holocaust. No Asylum brings Otto’s voice to life through his recently discovered letters, revealing for the first time the emotional tale of how the world turned its' back on the Franks.

The Year of the Discovery (2020)

In 1992 – 500 years after the beginning of Spain's global empire with the discovery of America – Spain proudly presented itself to the international community as a modern, developed, dynamic country through the Olympic Games in Barcelona and the Expo in Seville. But for filmmaker Luis López Carrasco (1981, Murcia), 1992 was also the year in which the regional parliament building in Cartagena was razed during furious protests against the threatened closure of various local industries. El año del descubrimiento revives this almost forgotten history in a typical Spanish bar in Cartagena, where different generations come together to drink, eat, smoke and talk. Stories from witnesses, demonstrators and strikers from back then and discussions among younger café visitors on themes such as class consciousness, the economic crisis and the role of unions percolate to the surface amidst talk of other life issues.

Paul Bowles: The Cage Door Is Always Open (2013)

The American composer and author Paul Bowles was a man with a great deal of charisma and influence. When he moved to Tangier, Morocco, in 1949, half the world followed him to the enigmatic city. His marriage with author Jane Bowles was a loving relationship of opposites, even though both were homosexual. Based on exclusive interviews with Bowles shortly before his death interwoven with anecdotes recounted by his friends and co-workers, the film portrays a daring and visionary life as well as a relationship shaped by an interdependency that encompassed much more than sexuality.

The Circle (2014)

A young teacher in Zurich in the 1950s falls in love with a transvestite star but is torn between his bourgeois existence and his commitment to homosexuality. He joins a gay organization that is eventually seen as the pioneer of gay emancipation in Europe.

Giger's Alien (1979)

Documentary about Giger's work for the movie Alien (1979).

Die Enkeltrick Betrüger (2024)

Grandchild fraudsters scare their victims on the phone with so-called "shock calls". The losses run into millions. Month after month. Many victims are left severely traumatized. But the scam has a weak point. And the izzy team has found it. During a year-long investigation, izzy figurehead Cedric Schild pretends to be an elderly person and supposed victim on the phone. This not only makes for a few laughs, but also drives the perpetrators crazy - at the same time, the editorial team penetrates deep into the structures of the criminal clans. Thanks to more than 1200 minutes of recorded conversations from real shock calls, the izzy film "Die Enkeltrick Betrüger" shows all the tricks used by fraudsters for the first time and thus makes an important contribution to prevention. In cooperation with the law enforcement authorities, the perpetrators are arrested in front of the cameras.

Like an Island (2022)

For mysterious reasons, two watchmen are made to guard access to the river in an area of Lausanne where retirees and immigrant families live. Through the different people they encounter, a territory takes shape and a friendship is born. Tizian Büchi creates a fable—part documentary, part fiction and tinged with magical realism—to subtly question our surveillance society.

The Blockchain and Us (2017)

When the Wright brothers invented the airplane in 1903, it was hard to imagine there would be over 500,000 people traveling in the air at any point in time today. In 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto invented Bitcoin and the blockchain. For the first time in history, his invention made it possible to send money around the globe without banks, governments or any other intermediaries. Satoshi is a mystery character, and just like the Wright brothers, he solved an unsolvable problem. The concept of the blockchain isn't very intuitive. But still, many people believe it is a game changer.

Special Flight (2011)

Switzerland still carries out special flights, where passengers, dressed in diapers and helmets, are chained to their seats for 40 hours at worst. They are accompanied by police officers and immigration officials. The passengers are flown to their native countries, where they haven't set foot in in up to twenty years, and where their lives might be in danger. Children, wives and work are left behind in Switzerland. Near Geneva, in Frambois prison, live 25 illegal immigrants waiting for deportation. They are offered an opportunity to say goodbye to their families and return to their native countries on a regular flight, escorted by plain-clothes police officers. If they refuse this offer, the special flight is arranged fast and unexpectedly. The stories behind the locked cells are truly heartbreaking.

Step Across the Border (1990)

An avant-garde documentary film on English guitarist, composer and improviser Fred Frith.

Ein Lied für Argyris (2006)

Fiancées (2019)

Cairo, a city of more than 20 million people, has recently gone through multiple political, cultural and economic upheavals, forcing Egyptian society to reinvent itself. In Egypt, people don't live on their own and it's only after they get married that they can leave their parent's home to create their own household. Whatever their intimate feelings might be, marriage is an inevitable step towards independence.

Play with the Devil – Becoming Zeal & Ardor (2023)

Zeal & Ardor catapults Swiss musician Manuel Gagneux from the underground to the world stage. Religion, racism, segregation and appropriation: Gagneux makes music against taboos. But being a leader against his will scares the introverted artist. Can he remix the game?

The Shelter (2014)

It is winter at an emergency shelter for the homeless in Lausanne. Every night at the door of this little-known basement facility the same entry ritual takes place, resulting in confrontations which can sometimes turn violent. Those on duty at the shelter have the difficult task of “triaging the poor”: the women and children first, then the men. Although the total capacity at the shelter is 100, only 50 “chosen ones” will be admitted inside and granted a warm meal and a bed. The others know it will be a long night.

Being Sascha (2021)

Sascha’s name wasn’t always Sascha. But now it is. Sascha doesn’t identify as a man or as a woman, but as trans non-binary. A story about what it means to live in a society that wasn’t expecting you. A glimpse into a life that allows us to question our own categories. And a film about what it means to be oneself.

Hardcore Chambermusic (2006)

This documentary follows swiss improvisation musicians and tells there stories.

Stephan Eicher - Le radeau des inutiles (2021)

Zwischenwelten - Unterschiedliche Wege des Heilens (2020)

A documentary about healers from the Swiss canton of Appenzell.

Il dottore – Ein Arzt fürs Leben (2023)

Doctor Stephan von Arx, MD, is retiring. As a family doctor, he has cared for his patients from the working class over generations. He was a factory doctor in the middle of the industrial district of Zuchwil. What will happen without him?

The Miraculous Transformation of the Working Class Into Foreigners (2024)

For more than one hundred years, the Swiss Social Democratic Party and the trade unions shaped Swiss working-class culture. In the seventies, this culture completely collapsed. The working class of yesteryear are called foreigners. An essay by an immigrant child from a former working class stronghold.